
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, April 2, 1990                   TAG: 9004020206
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

MATH, SCIENCE FINE, BUT ARTISTS ALSO ARE VITAL

I WAS IMPRESSED with the account of the very emotional response of members of Congress to Vaclav Havel's address in February. I was convinced that if I ever needed a speech writer, the very top of the line would be a good playwright. And his delivery of it might be expert as well.

I thought again that the business of our artists is to ask unasked questions and imagine unheard-of solutions, all the while affirming life even as truth is relentlessly pursued. I applaud Bush's plan to produce superior students in math and science. But to single out these disciplines is to proclaim that they are needed by our country more than any others.

Failure to cultivate an environment that will encourage artists in every field, including skills in language, native and foreign, will continue to hobble our educational system and compound the disaster that forms in the void. I am grateful to Havel for the lessons he so eloquently teaches.\ MARIETTA CARMICHAEL\ GALAX

by CNB